מדרש אויף ישעיהו 9:17

She weeps bitterly in the night (Lamentations 1:2) - Let our teacher the priests teach us - is it permitted for them to immerse for their terumah offering on the Ninth of Av? Rabbi Chanina the deputy High Priest said: It would suffice for the House of our God to forgo one immersion. (Beraisa Taanit 13a) Needless to say, we must recall the destruction of the Temple.

"You have bought Me no fragrant reed for silver" (Isaiah 43:24) - I did not tell you to bring bushels of incense, only the morning and afternoon portions. Consider: Micah's idol stood in the west, while the Temple stood in Shiloh. He would offer incense before Micah's idol abundantly, as it says "And they are coming with their cloud of incense" (Ezekiel 8:11). But in Shiloh they would offer only the morning and afternoon portions. The two smokes would intermingle and rise to the heavens, as it says "And the scent intermingled" (Isaiah 9:17). And God would say: To which do we pay heed - this or that?

Rabbi Eliezer said: Know thou the power of charity. Come and see from (the instance of) Saul, the son of Kish, who removed the witches and the necromancers from off the earth, and once again he loved that which he had hated. He went to En Dor, to the wife of Zephaniah, the mother of Abner, and he inquired of her for himself by the familiar spirit, and she brought for him Samuel the prophet, and the dead saw Samuel ascending, and they ascended with him, thinking that the resurrection of the dead had come, and the woman beheld, and she became very much confused, as it is said, "And the king said unto her, Be not afraid: for what seest thou?" (1 Sam. 28:13). Some say: Many righteous men like (Samuel) came up with him in that hour.